The present invention relates to the fields of residential or commercial structures, and models, toys, and play equipment. More specifically, it relates to the interconnection of panels for modular structures.
The building industry today is dominated by conventional designs and construction practices. Conventional building techniques are very time-consuming, generally requiring a substantial amount of field labor. Moreover, mobilizing fabrication resources to the field is expensive. Conventional construction is also dominated by volumetric spaces bounded by rectangular or mixed rectangular-trapezoidal shapes.
Departures from conventional designs such as the xe2x80x9chabitatxe2x80x9d presented at the 1967 Montreal Expo, or a more geometrically sophisticated modular construction system as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,173,538 entitled xe2x80x9cModular Construction Systemxe2x80x9d issued to Fleishman, which patent is hereby incorporated by reference as if fully set forth herein, attempts to simplify building construction while providing versatility and functionality. These modular construction designs often make use of standardized prefabricated units, commonly planar in configuration as to be used for walls, baseboards or ceilings, to simplify construction. Some modular designs call for interconnecting two planar units, while others call for interconnecting three planar units.
Construction using these standardized, prefabricated units or panels, however, continues to suffer from substantial limitations. Commonly, interconnecting these prefabricated units require the cumbersome step of aligning the long edges of the panels or walls, temporality holding them in place, and permanently securing the panels together using braces, screws, bolts or other fastening devices. Other times, a separate interconnecting part, providing grooves for the panels to fit into, is used to interconnect the prefabricated units. However, using these separate interconnecting parts still require more parts than the panels being interconnected and adds to the inventory of parts needed for a construction project. For a modular structure requiring interconnection of three panels, the assembly is even more cumbersome and costly as greater labor and number of parts are needed.
Accordingly, with the growing sophistication in modular design, there is a need for an improved assembly and method for joining or interconnecting two or three prefabricated units simply and effectively.
In a first separate aspect of the present invention, a system for interconnecting panels includes a hybrid connector, receptor connector, and locking connector. The hybrid connector has a tab that mates with an aperture of the receptor connector. The locking connector has a tab that mates with an aperture of the hybrid connector. As the connectors may be adapted to panels, mating the connectors interconnects the panels.
In a second separate aspect of the invention, the system for interconnecting panels of the first aspect of the invention further includes an extension tab lying orthogonal to the tab of the hybrid connector and/or the locking connector. The extension tab engages with the aperture of the corresponding connector so as to provide an additional locking action for interconnecting panels having panel connectors.
In a third separate aspect of the invention, a system for interconnecting panels includes hybrid, receptor and locking connectors having stiffening portions. The stiffening portions form interfitting profiles that fill the spaces between the three connectors which advantageously reduces the need to insulate the interconnection, assists in repelling foreign matter entry, and resists relative panel connector rotation where panel rotation is not needed during panel interconnection.
In a fourth separate aspect of the invention, a modular construction system includes panels having hybrid, receptor or locking connectors. The panels are interconnected such that a modular construction can be erected without the use of fastening devices.
In a fifth separate aspect of the present invention, a method for interconnecting panels for modular construction includes selecting panels having panel connectors, mating the hybrid connector to the receptor connector, and then mating the locking connector to the hybrid connector/receptor connector sub-assembly to interconnect the connectors attached to panels.
A sixth separate aspect of the present invention includes the combination of the foregoing aspects.
Other advantages will appear. The invention resides not only in the interconnection systems and methods to interconnect, but also in the construction of structures described and illustrated. The features shown with one embodiment may also be used with other embodiments.